218 - San Jose Municipal Rose Garden

2009/04/26

What amazes me most is not the beauty of this park, but the fact that I am not aware of this place all these years I've been here. Yet it's not surprising at all, for NONE of the people I talked to knows this little gem in the city. Is it because the valley is too big for us to get to know it in more detail, or is it because we kind of limited ourselves to only the things we are familiar with?

The garden is very tiny that you can see through it from the gate. There's no dedicate parking lot for it, but you can easily find a shady parking space by the fense : the trees along the sidewalk provide very nice shades. There are doors on each side of the garden, so you can simply park any place you like. We have no idea of this area (in the sense of housing price or school district), but it seems a nice quiet neighborhood.

The park is divided into two sections, one with roses and the other green grass field. We park immediately when we saw a parking space, so ended up walking all the way through the grass field to see the roses (park on the other side to avoid this *long* walk!). We are however impressed on the first sight of the colorful scene in front of us even from distance.

In the beginning I'm afraid that we would be here too early for the season, for I have the impression that the roses start to bloom in May. However, since it's not far away from my house, we decided to check it out before my mom leaves. And they are in bloom already!

I don't particularly like roses, but these big, bright colorful flowers are such eye-catching. Wiki said that it features more than 3500 rose shrubs representing 189 rose varieties. Imagine how glory it is whey they are all in bloom!

*Luckily*, they are not in display at the same time (otherwise what can people see in other months?). Though many are in bloom, which makes it beautiful enough, there are also many buds preparing themselves for heralding the summer! Nice to know they will take turns, so we can come back month after month to enjoy their fragrances and prettiness.

The only problem is that, I found I'm more interested in photographing the baby than the roses! Ha, otherwise I might spend hours here shooting each petals of each variaties to capture all the details of this small wonder.

My mom is so happy about it and highly recommanded it to her friends, so do I. She even asked me to go back for more photos in two weeks! Go visit the park if you have 1 hour free to spare on the coming weekends, you won't regret! (They have few picnic tables under the big trees so you can bring a lunchbox to rest and enjoy the view if you want to stay here longer).

PS. Typing English is much faster than Chinese (especially when I have only one hand free). I should be able to post more in English with the baby photos! But it's so difficult to express myself well in English ... anyway, bear with this one for now (both the English and the photos), Chinese version with *normal* photos is coming soon.

San Jose Municipal Rose Garden

The baby didn't seem happy because at first he was in sleep and then he was crying because of hunger ...